- 1 Los Angeles Lakers vs Los Angeles Clippers: two 20-point openers, a 9.5-point spread
- 2 Los Angeles Lakers: 38-11 as moneyline favorites last season and 12 covers in the last 15 at home
- 3 Los Angeles Clippers: five players out, a 25-point win anyway
- 4 Free NBA Prediction: Los Angeles Lakers vs Los Angeles Clippers
- 5 About our free predictions
- 6 No commitment from us
- 7 Information changes
- 8 Your responsibility
- 9 Responsible gambling
- 10 Legal age
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Los Angeles Lakers vs Los Angeles Clippers: two 20-point openers, a 9.5-point spread 
The Clippers’ bench outscored Sacramento’s 53-34 on Wednesday, and the starters never trailed in a 121-96 win at Intuit Dome. Darius Garland scored 30, Brook Lopez added 17 points and 11 rebounds off the bench, and rookie Keaton Wagler put up 15 points, 5 rebounds and 5 assists.
The Lakers were just as comfortable. They beat Golden State 127-105 at Crypto.com Arena, led 66-52 at halftime and stretched the margin past 30 in the third quarter. Los Angeles shot 46-of-81 from the field, 56.8%, and made 24 of 27 free throws.
Friday’s game tips off at 10:00pm ET at Crypto.com Arena, the first of the season between the two teams. The market has the Lakers as 9.5-point favorites with a moneyline of 1.26, and the Clippers are out at 4.35.
We’d look at that spread alongside the Clippers’ injury list. Bradley Beal (right knee management), Brandon Ingram (right heel surgery), Max Strus (partial plantar fascia tear), Jordan Miller (left rotator cuff surgery) and Yanic Konan Niederhauser (right foot surgery) all missed the opener, and the Clippers still won by 25.
The roster around them has changed almost completely. Kawhi Leonard went to Toronto last month after the league found the Clippers guilty of salary-cap circumvention, James Harden and Chris Paul were traded in the summer, and no team in the league had a bigger drop in average age from last season’s opening-night group.
Last season’s series finished 2-2. The Lakers won 135-118 in November and 125-122 in February, while the Clippers took the December game 103-88 and the January game 112-104.
Los Angeles Lakers: 38-11 as moneyline favorites last season and 12 covers in the last 15 at home 
Luka Doncic and Austin Reaves are the two numbers the books are building around. Doncic’s points line is set at 32.5 with 7.5 rebounds and 7.5 assists, and Reaves sits at 22.5 points. Walker Kessler’s line of 14.5 points and 10.5 rebounds tells us how central he’s become inside.
The opening night starters were Doncic, Reaves, Matisse Thybulle, Ziaire Williams and Kessler. That’s a group built to defend on the wings, with Thybulle and Williams taking the perimeter assignments that would have gone to bigger names in past seasons.
Collin Sexton is day-to-day with a soleus problem, as are Cameron Carr (oblique) and Adou Thiero (knee). None of the three starts, so the impact falls on the second unit, where Quentin Grimes and Sandro Mamukelashvili are also part of the rotation.
The betting record from last season backs the favorite. The Lakers went 38-11 when they were moneyline favorites and won all of their games at -400 or shorter. They went 45-36-1 against the spread overall, a cover rate just above 55%.
Home form adds to it. The Lakers covered the spread in 12 of their last 15 home games and won 13 of those 15 outright. Two of the four meetings with the Clippers last season, though, were decided by fewer than nine points.
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Los Angeles Clippers: five players out, a 25-point win anyway 
Garland’s 30 on Wednesday came in his first regular-season game as the focal point of this offense, and his line for Friday is 25.5 points and 7.5 assists. The Clippers scored 41 points in the first quarter against Sacramento and were never caught.
Rui Hachimura made his Clippers debut after coming over from the Lakers, finishing with 10 points and 8 rebounds. He’ll be facing a lot of familiar faces, and his points line of 17.5 suggests he’s expected to take on a bigger share than he did in the opener.
Lopez is the matchup piece. His outside shooting can pull a center away from the rim, and Kessler is the player he’d drag out of the paint. Kris Dunn and Derrick Jones Jr. are the defenders most likely to see Doncic and Reaves.
The off-court story hasn’t gone away. Steve Ballmer is serving a one-year suspension from team activities, the franchise was fined $30 million and it lost five consecutive first-round picks from 2029 to 2033. None of that showed up on the court on Wednesday.
The numbers against them come from last season’s team. The Clippers won 12 of 36 games as underdogs and didn’t win any as underdogs of +315 or longer. As underdogs of 9.5 points or more, they went 2-1 against the spread.
Probable lineup Los Angeles Lakers: Luka Doncic, Austin Reaves, Matisse Thybulle, Ziaire Williams, Walker Kessler
Probable lineup Los Angeles Clippers: Not announced at time of publication
Free NBA Prediction: Los Angeles Lakers vs Los Angeles Clippers
Our prediction: Los Angeles Clippers +10.5 (1.71)
We’d back the Clippers with the points. The Lakers are the better team and should win this game, but at 1.26 the moneyline isn’t worth playing, and a margin of 11 or more is a big ask against a team that just won by 25 with five players out.
The Lakers’ home record is the main argument against us. They covered in 12 of their last 15 at Crypto.com Arena, and Doncic can push any margin by himself. Last season’s series still had two games inside nine points and two Clippers wins, one of them by 15.
The Clippers’ bench gave them 53 points on Wednesday, and Lopez’s spacing gives them a specific answer to Kessler. Our expectation is a Lakers win by somewhere between five and nine points, which makes the extra point at +10.5 worth the slightly shorter price over +9.5.
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